Kept in dark about 7-hr delay, furious passengers ground Air-India officials

The fracas comes after an outburst by Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel on January 11, when his Air-India flight to New York was delayed by three hours: a livid Patel fired an operations manager and said courtesies like informing passengers about flight delays were vital.

Scheduled to take off at 6 am—passengers of AI 634 had checked in two hours earlier—the flight left only at 1.05 pm. The management of Air-India has reportedly taken a ‘‘very serious view’’ of the incident.

Duty manager P B Mistry and his two assistants Ulhas Kanivdekar and Jayaraman were made to squat on the floor, sarcastic jokes and abuses hurled at them.

Some passengers also began taking photos of the scared officials on their mobiles. Kanivdekar was also allegedly pushed around.

Air-India security—blaming the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) for not intervening—called Sahar police station.

An aircraft that came in from Gulf flew the stranded passengers to Delhi.

‘‘We regret the inconvenience caused to passengers and effective measures are being taken to prevent such an happening,’’ said Air-India Public Relations Director Jitendra Bhargava.

Bhargava said the delay was because of ‘‘technical work’’, with officials hoping it would soon be over. ‘‘But it did not (finish) eventually as per our expectations,’’ he said, explaining the cumbersome logistics of getting alternate aircraft at short notice.

But the passengers were mainly angry at what one source called ‘‘the casual approach’’ of officials, offering no refreshments or proper explanations.

‘‘The staff initially said a one-hour delay due to technical snag and the delay just went on and on,’’ said a source. ‘‘Then, they said a replacement plane will come in and even that was delayed.’’

The passengers first protested, squatted on the floor of the terminal building and then decided to disallow other passengers from going to board their flights.

The situation then descended into chaos, an eyewitness said.

A senior Air-India security official accused the Central Industrial Security Force of doing nothing when asked to the control the situation. The officer told the Indian Express: ‘‘The deputy commandant was told that passengers are getting out of hand, she was requested to take care (of the situation).’’

The security officer said: ‘‘She replied, ‘they are your passengers. They are in your hold and you should take care. We will not intervene’.’’

He said CISF were ‘‘mute spectators who encouraged passengers into doing something nasty.’’ Any ‘‘abnormal happening’’ on the airport premises, including ‘‘aggressive passenger behaviour’’, is CISF responsibility, the officer said.

But CISF senior commandant Anil Kumar said passengers were ‘‘restless, emotionally charged and demanding their right’’.

Kumar said as long as there was no law-and-order problem, there was no need for the CISF to intervene. ‘‘It was an issue between the airline and the passenger,’’ said Kumar. ‘‘We did not want to further aggravate the situation,’’ Kumar said.